[stylist] feedback/critique request - thanks

[The Crowd]

I loved that last part about the dear. I especially liked that you put in 
the hearing her part too. It made it incredably powerful.

I've seen the ocean, moutains, and Death Valley. I've seen snow and forests. 
I've seen the mighty Red Woods, and all of that before I went blind at ten.

I've never seen the Grand Canyon while sighted, or blind, for that matter, 
but I felt like I was there and could smell the heat and snow of it.


Thanks!
Atty

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Chris Kuell" <ckuell at comcast.net>
To: "Writer's Division Mailing List" <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2012 8:58 AM
Subject: [stylist] feedback/critique request - thanks


> Thanks to those who took the time to read and comment on my essay. Atty, 
> your input was especially appreciated, as you gave some excellent, 
> concrete suggestions. In my original draft, which was about 1400 words, I 
> wrote --as if God herself reached down from heaven-- but in an attempt to 
> cut any extraneous words, the pronoun got the axe.
>
>   Robert, there is indeed a famous range in Northern Arizona known as the 
> Coital Mountains, with one high plateau known as Mounting peak. It's 
> believed that 69% of all native Arizonians were conceived there. I begged 
> my wife to check it out while we were there, but instead she turned on the 
> air conditioner and drove 50 miles to the West of it.
>
> I appreciate your thoughts and comments on the essay. While I've written 
> perhaps two dozen essays and a complete novel about blindness and the 
> abilities of blind people, this isn't one of them. While I'll never write 
> about 'poor blind me', and I am fully aware of the misconceptions held by 
> the sighted world, when a sighted person is going through the process of 
> losing their sight, it can be a devastating ordeal. It's something that a 
> congenitally blind person can imagine, but can't relate to, just as a 
> sighted person can imagine what blindness is like, but they can't really 
> relate unless they've lived it.
>
> This was a travel essay, so I needed to cover what we saw and experienced 
> while visiting Arizona on that trip. The most important part, and what I 
> found difficult to put into words, was that deer showing up just as I was 
> about to leave, and was feeling very sad inside. To me, that der magically 
> being there was like a sign from God, or the universe, that everything was 
> going to be okay. I can't find the words to say why I felt that way, but 
> there, at that time, that's what I felt.
>
> And that's the important part of the essay. I've covered independent 
> travel in other essays, including one called 'I Think I Cane' which got me 
> $250 in a national contest a few years back. I've since gone back to 
> Arizona twice as a blind person, where I've hiked, visited Tombstone and 
> Rawhide and the Biodome, and even poked a sleeping rattlesnake with my 
> cane (from the safety of a car--it was sleeping on the blacktopped 
> street). But this essay was about a fun trip with my family, and that 
> deer.
>
> chris
>
>
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